March

In the late 1970s a shady company called Quasar Industries, capitalizing on popular enthusiasm for robots following the release of Star Wars, rolled out an elaborate hoax. It was a robot that purported to have speech recognition and be capable of dozens of household tasks, including vacuuming the living room and walking the dog. In fact it was all just marketing and puppetry. More interesting is that it spurred a debate in the barely-formed Internet community at the time about free speech. This excerpt from the excellent book Where Wizards Stay Up Late, about the birth of the Internet, is fascinating:
Then, in the spring of 1977, Quasar rolled in the door. Its arrival marked the beginning of the first debate over free speech in cyberspace. The controversy centered on an unusual device made by Quasar Industries and blew up into an argument over using the taxpayer- fundedARPANETto speak, in openly critical terms, about a private company.
The brainchild of Quasar Industries, the device stood five feet four...